Aryan Khan Clean Chit: Govt Orders Action Against Ex-NCB Official Sameer Wankhede For 'Shoddy Investigation'

NCB officials, which filed its chargesheet in a Mumbai court, said Aryan Khan and five others had not been named due to "lack of sufficient evidence".

Mumbai: The government has asked the Finance Ministry to take appropriate action against former Zonal Director Sameer Wankhede for his "shoddy investigation" into the high-profile Aryan Khan drugs haul case hours after the Narcotics Control Bureau’s charge sheet gave a clean chit to actor Shah Rukh Khan's son, sources told news agency ANI.  

Earlier in the day, NCB officials, which filed its chargesheet in a Mumbai court, said Aryan Khan and five others had not been named due to "lack of sufficient evidence".

"It is learnt that the government has asked Competent Authority to take appropriate action against ex-NCB official Sameer Wankhede for his shoddy investigation into Aryan Khan drugs haul case. Government has already taken action in Wankhede's fake caste certificate case," sources told ANI.

Wankhede is an Indian Revenue Service officer and the finance ministry is the nodal authority to take the action against him.

Reacting to the development, NCB DG SN Pradhan told CNN-News18 that the "initial investigation has found many flaws in the way Wankhede handled the case". "We are shortly going to come up with the final report on Vigilance Enquiry on Wankhede. Initial investigation has found many flaws in the way he handled the case," Pradhan told CNN-News18.

Meanwhile, the federal anti-drugs agency is also probing corruption angle and the details will shortly come out in the report.

NCB's Mumbai zonal office arrested eight people, including Aryan Khan, October 2 last year from the international cruise terminal and the vessel that was operated by a company called Cordelia. Wankhede and his team conducted the raid of the cruise ship.

Announcing Aryan Khan's clearance, NCB said that its special investigation team (SIT) carried out its probe in an "objective manner" adding that "the touchstone of the principle of proof beyond reasonable doubt has been applied".

Wankhede was removed from the probe on November 6, 2021 and the case was transferred a Delhi-based SIT formed under its deputy director general (operations) Sanjay Kumar Singh.

Responding to NCB's order, Aryan Khan's advocate Satish Maneshinde said that arrest of his client was unjustified and thanked SIT for investigating the case in an objective manner.

"The arrest and detention of Aryan Khan for 26 days was unjustified, more particularly when he was not found in possession of any drugs. There was no evidence of any kind, no material of any nature of violation of any law under the NDPS Act was found. We are happy that the Special Investigation Team under Sanjay Kumar Singh investigated the case in an objective manner and decided not to file a complaint against Aryan Khan for lack of sufficient evidence. God is great. Satya Meva Jayate," Maneshinde told ABP News.

Apart from Aryan Khan, the NCB also gave clean chits to Avin Sahu, Gopal Anand, Samir Sehgal, Bhaskar Arora and Manav Singhal. While Sahu was a guest on the ship Cordelia Cruise, others were the organisers of the alleged rave party on board.